What should the United States do about North African pirate states that plundered American shipping?
On September 11, 2001, terrorists struck the United States, killing about 4,000 people. The U.S. president responded by declaring a war on terrorism. He got Congress to authorize using force against any nation, organization, or person involved in the attack or against any nation harboring the terrorist organizations. When the United States began, it faced another foreign policy test: How should it respond to the Barbary pirates who were plundering its ships? In the 1700s, the countries along the southern coastline of the Mediterranean Sea were called the Barbary States. They included Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli. Named after the Berbers, one of North Africa’s native peoples, the Barbary States were little pirate kingdoms that plundered the merchant ships of many nations. The Barbary pirates were mostly Berbers, Arabs, and other Muslims, but some came from Christian Europe. The pirates used small, fast-moving vessels to capture trading ships and their cargoes. They held the crew
